"Check Engine"

Yesterday morning, Skip and I headed out to do some things in Brownsville. When he started the car engine it was chugging and the 'Check Engine' light came on the dashboard. Eek! We drove it to the edge of the parking lot but it continued to chug. We parked the car and tried to find the closest Subaru dealer. I called the closest one - in Pharr, TX 70 miles away - and he said he couldn't do anything for us until Monday. If we weren't going to be using the car much this weekend we decided to make a shopping trip to stock up on enough food to get us through the weekend.

While stopping to fill the tank with gas, I asked the clerk at the gas bar if he knew any local mechanics that would service a Subaru. He recommended that we go to "Robert's" and gave me the address. We arrived at Robert's garage and were told he would be right back by one of the 3 mechanics. His desk was at the side of an garage open at the front and back and there were about 10 sets of keys sitting there belonging to cars waiting to be serviced. After 1/2 hour, Robert arrived and assigned one of the mechanics to hook the car up to the 'scope'. He explained that he probably couldn't do much today but he could certainly order parts and do the repairs if that was required. Nunfo, the mechanic, checked all the spark plug wires and sprayed the connections in case there was any moisture there. It was very humid and I would not have been surprised if there had been condensation in the gas tank. He took it for a test drive and deemed it 'fixed'. $45 poorer (money well spent, I might add) we drove away much relieved that we didn't have serious car problems 3200km away from home.

We had worked up a hunger so decided to have lunch in Brownsville before hitting the driving range (the reason why we were going to Brownsville in the first place). We pulled in at 'Emilia's' a very busy Mexican restaurant (which are understandably plentiful here). We determine a restaurant's quality by the number of cars in the parking lot and Emilia's lot was full.

After lunch we drove to the Fort Brown Golf Course adjacent to the University of Texas at Brownsville.

The golf course is on the Mexican side of the levee and if the US ever builds the wall they've been threatening to build, it would cut it off from the rest of the US.






It is so close to Mexico that when I faced northwest to take Skip's photo, a Mexican Flag was visible behind him.






















Also, there is a sign posted in the clubhouse that says. "Golfballs are not to be driven into Mexico. Violators will be prosecuted."

While Skip drove golfballs, I sat in the car with the windows down and got a lot knit on the Madli's scarf. It was glorious with the hot wind blowing, cooling things off just enough. I decided to start the second lace edge that will be grafted on to the centre part. Once it's knit, I will know exactly how much yarn will be left to knit the centre part and get the maximum number of repeats completed with a minimum amount of yarn left over.